Your first experience of foreign train travel

[elbows47]

^^^
I think you went from Paris Est to Clermont Ferrand - my father went by the same route on his school exchange trip when he was 15.

Thanks for that, but I'm not sure about that as we definitely took the metro from Gare du Nord to wherever we went south from. As Nord to Est is only a fairly short walk, I don't think we would have taken the Metro. Unfortunately I don't have my old school fieldtrip notebook now in case I recorded it.

 

[Journeyman]

We went on a family holiday to Benidorm in 1979, when I was five years old. I can only very vaguely remember it, but we went on what felt like a rather rickety narrow-gauge diesel train that is now part of a modern light rail network.

First clear memory is extensive travel around Switzerland in 1986, on a school trip. It was brilliant - Zurich to Interlaken, where we were staying, plus a number of the mountain railways, including the Jungfraubahn. Sadly can't remember all of them, but it was great stuff.

Not long after that, went to the Algarve and got to see some trains, although not travel on them, and I got a nice shot of one of the Portuguese Class 50 clones.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

So, to sum up: Day-trips were pretty normal by members of the Western Allies. They weren't subject to East German immigration restrictions as long as they stayed within Berlin, and East Berlin offered *some* things at an incredibly good price, such as theatre/opera and strangely enough, sheet music. It would have been nothing out of the ordinary for a British soldier to go over to East Berlin when not on duty, although they were clearly instructed not to provoke the East German authorities.

And, of course, a Soviet War Memorial was actually in West Berlin (in Tiergarten near the Reichstag, in the British sector) which had a permanent Soviet military guard.

Now that Friedrichstrasse is back to being just a busy city centre S/U-Bahn interchange station, it's amazing how relatively mundane it is compared to its life as a hostile cold war border station bristling with in-your-face controls.
Can still remember the statuesque armed border guards in their stations in the canopy, above the eyeline of the passengers.

 

[Calthrop]

It would have been nothing out of the ordinary for a British soldier to go over to East Berlin when not on duty, although they were clearly instructed not to provoke the East German authorities.

@Cloud Strife: Many thanks; for whole, very interesting and illuminating, post. The set-up as described, just feels "counter-intuitive" vis-a-vis the general impression of "things Cold War", liable to be entertained by an ordinary Western civilian with no particular specialist interest in Berlin-related matters. Reinforces my overall feeling, that the whole divided-Berlin scene was basically insane -- in ways spanning the entire spectrum from the horrific to the farcical !

My bolding above: so wandering around railway installations ad lib, photographing copiously and conspicuously, would not have been a good idea ...

 

[Cloud Strife]

@Calthrop, it's my pleasure. I've spent countless hours researching this topic, so it's good to be able to share it with others! I've done some more digging into my books, and I've discovered that the general idea (at least from the American point of view) was that they encouraged trips to East Berlin for sightseeing when military personnel were off-duty. The reason for it was to ensure that the "Right of Free Access" was maintained, as well as allowing trained military personnel the chance to observe what was going on within East Berlin. Their orders explicitly forbade photographing 'military installations', which in Warsaw Pact speak actually meant a wide range of things, including railway infrastructure.

Yes, Berlin was very surreal in many ways during the Cold War. For instance, it was routine for West Berliners to make use of the duty-free shop here:

(about 4:15-4:20) if you're viewing on mobile). This was located within Friedrichstraße station (in East Germany), which acted as a transfer station not only between West and East Berlin, but also as a transfer station between the U and the S-Bahn for West Berliners. As a result, the East German government made a considerable amount of money from duty-free sales there, and the West Berlin customs authority was known to stop people coming from Friedrichstraße with shopping bags. They even had a bookshop there, where you could order any publication that was available in East Germany. Apparently this did a remarkable amount of business with West Berliners!

From a transport point of view, there were quite a few odd things about the divided Berlin. For instance, the East Berlin airport at Schoenfeld was also used by West Germans looking for cheap package holidays, and so a special West Berlin bus operated to the airport. This bus was only allowed to be a single-decker, and it wasn't permitted to carry advertising. They were allowed to transit through to the airport with minimal formalities, and I believe that they used a special terminal in Schoenfeld Airport, though I'm open to be corrected on this one.

(edit: it appears that I'm mistaken, and that the buses used belonged to the East Berlin bus company. It seems that the story was even more interesting - as Schoenfeld was better for connections to cities such as Prague, Budapest and Vienna, West Berliners preferred to use Schoenfeld over Tegel/Templehof. The Western airlines that flew from West Berlin were desperately unhappy with the situation, but because the buses only operated a single stop within West Berlin, there was nothing that could be done to stop the service. As another random point, no German airline was allowed to fly into Berlin airports, but because Schoenfeld is just outside Berlin, the East German flag carrier Interflug could operate there. In West Berlin, commercial service could only be provided by companies registered in France, the UK and the USA.)

(as an aside, one interesting note is that in Nicosia today, there's no cross-border public transport).

 

[Welly]

Thanks for that, but I'm not sure about that as we definitely took the metro from Gare du Nord to wherever we went south from. As Nord to Est is only a fairly short walk, I don't think we would have taken the Metro. Unfortunately I don't have my old school fieldtrip notebook now in case I recorded it.

I made a mistake - my father did not go to Clermont Ferrand but went to Chaumont Chalindrey which was and is definitely served by Est!

 

[Cricketer8for9]

On Berlin it certainly was a curious place. I was there for school holidays July 1982 to Jan 1985 and went back in 1999. Very curious walking over a double line of cobbles in the street instead of going through the rigmarole of Checkpoint Charlie.

 

[Calthrop]

They even had a bookshop there, where you could order any publication that was available in East Germany. Apparently this did a remarkable amount of business with West Berliners!

One would figure, I suppose: that West Berliners keenly interested in national affairs, would be interested in getting access to East German published material -- taking the opportunity to tease worthwhile info out of the propaganda / bombast / nonsense. Also, one takes it that even in East Germany, not everything was about politics: and that East Germans knowledgeable about assorted other subjects, wrote about them and had published, books containing good stuff and worth acquiring by interested folks "abroad".

(as an aside, one interesting note is that in Nicosia today, there's no cross-border public transport).

Way off-topic; but at times I have sadly mused, on the subject of Cyprus's delightful 2ft 6in gauge railway, abandoned at the end of 1951: if by some miracle, this line had lasted for another couple of decades after that -- the invasion and splitting-off of Turkish North Cyprus, would inevitably have put an end to it. The line's course runs pretty well parallel to the border between the "two Cypruses" -- cut by it at a couple of points, one near Nicosia.

 

[SteveM70]

1986, Zeebrugge to Arlon, age 16 and with a thundering hangover.

 

[Richard Scott]

Looking at video of U-Bahn service it says 'Tegel' on the rear car - did U-Bahn ever serve Tegel (assuming it means Tegel airport) or was that a suburb and the station's been renamed? Sorry it's a bit off topic just interested? Thanks for posting that certainly of interest especially as when I did German at school we studied East and West so always had a bit of a fascination with Berlin, finally got there in 2002 so lots had changed by then.

 

[Richard Scott]

Think I managed to answer my own question, see there is a place called Tegel at end of one of the lines!

 

[Cricketer8for9]

Tegel is a suburb of Berlin.

 

[Gag Halfrunt]

They even had a bookshop there, where you could order any publication that was available in East Germany. Apparently this did a remarkable amount of business with West Berliners!

I would imagine that the bookshop sold East German editions of classic literature at low prices (and popular fiction from before the division of the country, such as Karl May's Westerns).

 

[ChiefPlanner]

I would imagine that the bookshop sold East German editions of classic literature at low prices (and popular fiction from before the division of the country, such as Karl May's Westerns).

O/Topic - found a bookshop in East Berlin where I got a book on the S-Bahn (subsequently caused me trouble at the exit point when I had to explain my railway interest - easily covered by showing my BR credentials) , - this was 1985 - but a bit worrying for a few moments while the Stassi Lt eyed me up - plenty of focused literature on Marx etc available.

 

[duesselmartin]

Looking at video of U-Bahn service it says 'Tegel' on the rear car - did U-Bahn ever serve Tegel (assuming it means Tegel airport) or was that a suburb and the station's been renamed? Sorry it's a bit off topic just interested? Thanks for posting that certainly of interest especially as when I did German at school we studied East and West so always had a bit of a fascination with Berlin, finally got there in 2002 so lots had changed by then.

Public transport to Tegel Airport is with the TXL bus.
Tempelhof has a U-Bahn stop near by and the runway is now a recreational area
Railway wise Tegel is interesting as up to 25 years ago, French military trains ran to and from Tegel.

But that is all OT.

 

[Calthrop]

I would imagine that the bookshop sold East German editions of classic literature at low prices (and popular fiction from before the division of the country, such as Karl May's Westerns).

Indeed, yes -- before reading this post, it didn't occur to me that the opportunity of getting apolitical stuff at a lesser price than in the West, might have been a factor !

 

[Cloud Strife]

One would figure, I suppose: that West Berliners keenly interested in national affairs, would be interested in getting access to East German published material -- taking the opportunity to tease worthwhile info out of the propaganda / bombast / nonsense. Also, one takes it that even in East Germany, not everything was about politics: and that East Germans knowledgeable about assorted other subjects, wrote about them and had published, books containing good stuff and worth acquiring by interested folks "abroad".

Yes, it was certainly the case. East Germany did have a fairly good, although limited cultural scene, and authors such as Christa Wolf were well known in West Germany. Apparently East Berlin was also a very good place to get high quality musical recordings at a very cheap price, and the East Germans were happy to allow the export of such things.

Way off-topic; but at times I have sadly mused, on the subject of Cyprus's delightful 2ft 6in gauge railway, abandoned at the end of 1951: if by some miracle, this line had lasted for another couple of decades after that -- the invasion and splitting-off of Turkish North Cyprus, would inevitably have put an end to it. The line's course runs pretty well parallel to the border between the "two Cypruses" -- cut by it at a couple of points, one near Nicosia.

Yes, it's always struck me as interesting that Cyprus doesn't have a functional railway. At the very least, you would think that Nicosia to Limmasol via Larnaca Airport would be a very logical route for a railway service. Likewise with North Cyprus, where a railway running from North Nicosia to Famagusta would surely be useful. As it stands, it's actually very difficult to get around Cyprus due to the intercity bus network being...well, poor.

Looking at video of U-Bahn service it says 'Tegel' on the rear car - did U-Bahn ever serve Tegel

It's one of the odd things about West Berlin that they never built a metro connection to Tegel Airport. It's not clear to me as to why, although West Berlin was very pro-car for at least half of its existence. After reunification, the city simply didn't have the money, although I believe that the original post-reunification plan for the U5 was that it would extend from Alexanderplatz via the Bundestag to Tegel Airport. I suspect it may still happen in time, as the area in what is now Tegel Airport is earmarked to become a very large new housing development.

 

[30907]

It's one of the odd things about West Berlin that they never built a metro connection to Tegel Airport. It's not clear to me as to why, although West Berlin was very pro-car for at least half of its existence. After reunification, the city simply didn't have the money, although I believe that the original post-reunification plan for the U5 was that it would extend from Alexanderplatz via the Bundestag to Tegel Airport. I suspect it may still happen in time, as the area in what is now Tegel Airport is earmarked to become a very large new housing development.

Planning for the new Berlin-Brandenburg airport started in 1995 (says Herr W.K.Pedia) which presumably put a Tegel extension on hold.

 

[Calthrop]

Yes, it's always struck me as interesting that Cyprus doesn't have a functional railway. At the very least, you would think that Nicosia to Limmasol via Larnaca Airport would be a very logical route for a railway service. Likewise with North Cyprus, where a railway running from North Nicosia to Famagusta would surely be useful. As it stands, it's actually very difficult to get around Cyprus due to the intercity bus network being...well, poor.

It would seem that Cyprus basically missed its chance with the railway age. The narrow-gauge Cyprus Government Railway as was (one line, Famagusta -- Nicosia -- Morphou and rather pointlessly, a bit further on) seems to have been a sort of "Southwold be-alike" -- delectable for those who like that sort of thing, but found generally to be a white elephant: come the early 1950s, it had to go. If rail matters had been different on the island from the start, then maybe...??

 

[Taunton]

It's one of the odd things about West Berlin that they never built a metro connection to Tegel Airport.

Several of us who went to Berlin pre (and post) reunification seem to have been fascinated with it.

Tegel was not the airport of West Berlin until 1975, when the flights all moved over from Tempelhof. There was one airport in each sector, including in the East (not the current Schonefeld airport, which was actually just outside East Berlin, in GDR proper, giving rise to a further set of bureaucratic conundrums if you wanted to use it). Notably, not all but many of these issues could be overcome if you worked with the system, and the population on both sides seemed able to do so - although not the impression given by politicians, from either camp.

The "duty free" Intershop kiosks on Friedrichstr platforms sold to "westerners" not entering East Berlin, as it was also an interchange between west side S-Bahn (elevated) and U-Bahn (tunnel) without entering East Berlin. The key thing about them was they only accepted western currency (principally Deutschmarks), it was a means of the state collecting this. There was also surprisingly more trade between east and west than might be expected. The water supply in the west wholly came from the GDR.

The Intershop staff, like others who interchanged with the West, were appropriately selected (like the many GDR seamen) from those with families and children who remained in the GDR, and thus were unlikely to want to escape. Most were within a few years of retirement, after which you could more readily cross to the west (escaping retirees would save the GDR pension costs). The principal item sold was cigarettes, at slightly below western prices; it was called "duty free" but of course the GDR government collected it all.

I never quite got the position of the staff on the isolated S-Bahn network in West Berlin, operated by the DR (GDR). I believe they were westerners, but paid by the east, only at the official GDR staff rate and topped up by the West government. I gather wages fell behind and ultimately there was a strike which led in the 1980s to quite an amount of the west side S-Bahn network closing. The movable barriers across the link track, shown in the video linked above, were used to move the trains, owned by the DR, back and forth to the maintenance depot. I read they were propelled to the halfway point by a diesel shunter from the west, and then picked up at the other end by a shunter from the east, so no driver had to cross the border.

You had to exchange 25 (I think) Deutschmarks for GDR Marks at a 1:1 exchange rate each day as you crossed over, actually I used to change more as the better restaurants in East Berlin were as good as anywhere and you could have a very pleasant lunch and dinner there. Transport was ludicrously cheap, I can't remember (someone else will) whether the tram was still 5 Pfennigs, about a penny. No conductor, you just put the money in a box by the door and pressed a handle, whereupon it was displayed with the last few fares through the glass, before falling into the cash vault below with a ker-ching. No tickets. Season ticket holders (monthly only I think) would hold them up high for all the other passengers to see.

East Berlin suburbs, and tramway/S-Bahn etc expanded across the city line into the GDR, completely unmarked, but a day visitor to East Berlin was prohibited from crossing the line.

I have upstairs a book called "Berlin Transit" https://www.amazon.com/Berlin-Transit-1986-87-J-H-Price/dp/0906273269 , written by J H Price, the longstanding editor of Cooks Continental Timetable, also great tramway buff and editor of Modern Tramway magazine; it was very useful and describes all the various combinations of transport and border crossing, which varied depending on whether you were West German, Allies (so being British an advantage), or third party, including for example the challenges of taking a taxi across the border at a time when many of the West Berlin drivers were Turkish.

 

[Beebman]

I visited Berlin in 1977 with my parents. We went on a Berolina coach tour of East Berlin which entered through Checkpoint Charlie (Friedrichstrasse) and my Dad had to exchange DMs for Ostmarks at a 1:1 rate but I can't remember how much he needed to change. Apart from a stop at a cafe on the edge of the city centre, the only oipportunity to spend the Ostmarks was on souvenirs which the GDR tour guide had brought with him. My Dad bought a small picture book 'Berlin Heute: Haupstadt der DDR' and some postage stamps depicting the Göltzschtalbrücke viaduct (recently featured in Tim Dunn's TV series). I still have those - the book is priced at 9 Ostmarks and the stamp set is 4 x 25 Ostpfennings so my Dad obviously had 10 Ostmarks to use up.

Also during our time in West Berlin we went on a ride on the U-Bahn through the East and it was fascinating to see the armed personnel on the closed stations, but we didn't stop for the duty-free shop. It was an amazing 3-day visit which began and ended with a train trip through the GDR to and from Hannover via Helmstedt/Marienborn which I've mentioned elsewhere.

 

[Gonzoiku]

Just one more repost from last year for anyone who is interested.

This thread has proved to be quite interesting, and I thought I might add a bit more to it by going into some deeper detail regarding our bi annual trips to cold war Poland, including some of the preparations. Unfortunately, it’s turned out to be a very long post so apologies for this. However, I hope you may find it interesting reading. I’d make a cup of tea first though.

--snip

Apologies if I seem to have hijacked the thread. Please return to first time on a foreign train posts.

Thanks for the re-post, citycat, I missed the original, but you have reminded me of my first foreign train journey, 1970, Manchester to Moscow, so you didn't hijack the threadf at all.

We must have left Manchester Piccadilly for Euston, with an overnight in London (where our group of a dozen or so teenage boys were "excited" to stay at the YWCA in Marylebone!), ferry Dover-Ostend, change of train in Aachen then overnight to West Berlin where we spent the day, then on to the Moscow sleeper via Warsaw, decant for the bogie-swap (change of gauge) at Brest-Litovsk and on through Minsk before arriving into Belorusskiy Vokzal in Moscow.

I echo what you say about the East German passport control, which combined the ridiculous detail of the Soviet system with the fastidious attentiveness to procedure of the German. Not pleasant! Soviet border controls were far more cursory by comparison, although while decanted at Brest-Litovsk the luggage left in the compartments was rifled! Unlike your experience, I do recall women working the train, and in the restaurant car breakfast served by a burly lady dressed entirely in whites comprised barely-cooked omelette with a few bits of assumed bacon swilling around in it, served on a battered aluminium dish reminiscent of what could have been bought in an army surplus shop back home. A request to have the egg cooked without bacon was clearly not covered by the customer-service training manual, for the offending (offensive?) dish was removed. Without replacement!

We continued to Leningrad by rail, of which journey I have little memory, and - sorry - return from Leningrad was by ship rather than rail. The same ship that was used the following year to "repatriate" 105 Soviet diplomats expelled from UK. As far as I recall we were supervised by one teacher throughout, with Intourist guides joining in Moscow and Leningrad. We must have been very obedient! In later life one of our number did a stint as BBC correspondent in Moscow, while another holds a professorship in Russian literature, so the experience can't have been entirely off-putting. And I have lost count of the number of return visits I have made...

GZ

 

[Taunton]

The Intershops in GDR were all around, out on the street, in major hotels, and also at service stations on the "corridor" Autobahn to Berlin. These latter roads had border controls in/out of the west, but were fully mixed traffic using them across the GDR, and at the service station - apparently divided families used to go and have combined birthday parties there.

At the time I had a Praktika SLR camera, bought in Britain but GDR made, in the old Zeiss factory. They had the full range of zoom lenses etc for it in the Intershop. Prices were about 25% off compared to UK list.

A notable feature of older Berliners, which I still found when there last year, is the desire of those, especially the older ones, from the west side to tell you which Zone they were brought up in. It does seem the different zones had different policies for schooling - American Zone children seem to have had much more English class teaching than others. I also notice nowadays in the combined city that nobody wants to say they were from the East.

A request to have the egg cooked without bacon was clearly not covered by the customer-service training manual, for the offending (offensive?) dish was removed. Without replacement!

Russian style. You get used to it. I have written here before that a recent trip in the elegantly refurbished restaurant car of a Russian overnight St Petersburg-Moscow train ordered coffee, which came black. A request (by Russian companion) for cream was responded that there was none. We then ordered fruit salad, which came with a huge serving of whipped cream on top. The cream was for the fruit, you understood, and NOT for the coffee. Often this approach is done not unpleasantly, almost apologetically, but rules are rules. Americans think they are looking for tips, and find that doesn't sometimes work either.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

I never worked out what was going on at Griebnitzsee station on the West Berlin-DDR border to the west, near Potsdam (this was 1977).
There was obviously a DR loco crew change there, and all staff movements on the platform were conducted under armed guard (to wolf whistles from the passengers!).
I assumed the new eastbound crew were Wessie DR staff who could not go further into the DDR, relieving a DDR crew who could not go into West Berlin.

30 years after unification, there are still two cross-border routes which have still not been restored.
The original route onwards from Griebnitzsee towards the city was the first railway in Berlin, the "Stammbahn".
But it ran directly along the route of the border wall and was abandoned in favour of the local route via Wannsee, avoiding the wall section, which still exists.
The city can't work out what to do with the old straight route, and it is unlikely to be restored.

The other problematic crossing is the old Dresdnerbahn route, directly south from the new Hbf, and also cut by the border/wall.
It had an S-bahn line to just south of the outer ring at Blankenfelde, as well as carrying the main line to Dresden.
This was initially cut back to the last station in West Berlin (Lichtenrade), while long-distance trains went via the outer ring and East Berlin.
The S-bahn was restored across the border since unification, but only as a single track.
The mainline connection to Dresden is via the Leipzig line (Anhalterbahn), which has a complicated loop onto the outer ring railway further west.
So Dresden trains now have to navigate that connection and then another link at Glasowerdamm back onto the Dresdnerbahn before heading south.
The idea after unification was to restore the original main line route, and also use it for the fast link to Berlin's new Brandenburg airport replacing Schönefeld.
But it has got stuck in the planning mire and the new airport will open later this year without the intended connection from Hbf.
Trains to Dresden probably lose 10 minutes by having to navigate the existing junctions to reach its proper line.

 

[Ianno87]

We went on a family holiday to Benidorm in 1979, when I was five years old. I can only very vaguely remember it, but we went on what felt like a rather rickety narrow-gauge diesel train that is now part of a modern light rail network.

Those ancient diesel units were still going when I went on holiday there in 1998. We had a trip to Alicante and back. "Highlight" of the return trip was a collision with a moped rider weaving some level crossing barriers (he was OK other than having one heck of a blow to the head)

 

[ivzem]

The other problematic crossing is the old Dresdner Bahn route, directly south from the new Hbf, and also cut by the border/wall.
[...]
But it has got stuck in the planning mire and the new airport will open later this year without the intended connection from Hbf.

Construction has actually finally started on that route now, although there were several legal challenges by homeowners along the route.

 

[leedslad82]

I was very lucky. My first foreign train journey i was 21 and in japan. Express train from narita airport to tokyo. Then bullet train from tokyo to naggano. Was so impressed with service.

My 2nd was overnight sleeper train in Thailand following year. Complete opposite to trains in japan

 

[Yew]

If we're excluding rail-based tourist attractions, I think it would be last year, Briancon-Lyon, on a local DMU, and then a duplex TGV from Valance-Lyon St Exupery.

Overall an enjoyable trip, with pretty scenery in the alps on a big-windowed DMU, and the feeling of going very fast on multi-floored train for the TGV leg.


Earlier this year I used Marsaille-Briancon for a Skiing trip, certainly more civilized than a normal ski-bus to the mountain.